I know you are. That's why you'll be as shocked as everybody else if it actually occurs. None of your remedies, by the way, will work. Without power, there isn't power to move power. You don't just plug a power cord into a dam's generator.

I can buy that the transformers on the dam might go into overload and volatilize some fluids best left fluid. But I don't see that kind of power making a serious dent on the turbine generators after they've opened the circuit at the transformer. Magic smoke goes out of the electricals and leaves them open, not closed, circuits. Either the transformers fail and stop transitioning power, or they keep working, but I don't believe the do both. This tends to leave intact generators encased in kilotons of grounded reinforced concrete. If that does not constitute "hardened", I don't know what does.

Transformers not connected to power during the event can then be put online for temporary, local fixes. I doubt very extremely that everybody gives up electrical power as a bad job without serious stupidity in play.

Pardon my ignorance, but won't a emp/carrington event damage electrical devices even if they're offline or not plugged in? My limited understanding was that it induced current flow in unshielded devices, so to Bill's point you're hosed regardless and they become nice multi-ton paperweights?

These guys keep talking about circuit breakers and off-line as if any of that protects against EMP. We'll get some warning on a Carrington Event, but I'd be surprised if they shut down the national grid in advance. And even if they did, yes, Mr. B., there would still be massive damage to the transformer net:

Ummm, with the way LA is set up, they will also not have any drinking water, in no time. At least NYC will just fall back to lower levels of available water, but some of the filtration systems will no longer be effective, so that's going to be a problem there, too. Food transport will be problems in both areas. Effective police and firefighting services, will basically be gone. Too many problems....

DC has a lot of protected military facilities, but I can't guess how much of those facilities have been pillaged by the present administration.

But the old TVA, should be able to restore quite a bit of the surrounding area, but it will take maybe years.

These guys keep talking about circuit breakers and off-line as if any of that protects against EMP. We'll get some warning on a Carrington Event, but I'd be surprised if they shut down the national grid in advance. And even if they did, yes, Mr. B., there would still be massive damage to the transformer net:

Yes, both eastern and western portions of the grid are too tied into the national grid to do a proper shutdown. Texas (except the panhandle) is trying to implement some measures for protection, but I'm not sure how.much they will get into place.

Essentially, any widespread disruption to the grid will result in chaos. As food and water supplies dwindle and disappear without hope of resupply for lack of adequate transportation, the social order will collapse and the worst nightmare of government desperately attempting to maintain control will become real. The cities will burn.

These guys keep talking about circuit breakers and off-line as if any of that protects against EMP. We'll get some warning on a Carrington Event, but I'd be surprised if they shut down the national grid in advance. And even if they did, yes, Mr. B., there would still be massive damage to the transformer net:Severe Space Weather--Social and Economic Impacts - NASA Science

I'm speaking about it as somebody who has worked with electronics for over twenty-five years in some pretty extreme conditions. EMP is a measurable force event, not a malignant spirit that seeks out electronics to kill their first-born child.

My problem with EMP as a potential world-ender is that Occupy and Anonymous aren't using it. If EMP was the kind of amazing techno-death event frequently envisioned, even the lazy, useless sons of fifty fathers in Occupy and Anonymous and other nihilist obsessives would be be using it routinely to shut down police cars and other emergency service vehicles. Ex-boyfriend stalkers would be killing their former girlfriend's Prius and ex-girlfriend stalkers would be wiping out their former boyfriend's game console's. I believe EMP is a weak threat because human nature is weak and too many people with the knowledge to create EMP devices should be using them to inflict evil.

I've been to Halabja and seen the result of Saddam Hussein using chemical weapons on the Kurds because he was threatened by their independence. I've been to Dachau and seen the same kind of human evil using technology to cause massive harm. I've watched the same kind of self-centered obsessives protesting US Navy ships and I can not see them drawing the line on the use of EMP. If EMP were that threatening, it would be getting abused by selfish people who enshrine their own anger above all restraint.

Ummm, with the way LA is set up, they will also not have any drinking water, in no time.

As we here in the Pacific Northwet often tell Angelenos when they try and claim they have some moral right to our water and electricity, that's what you get for living in a desert. It's not? Well, not this year...

Look, psi is welcome to his own opinions, but not to his own facts. And he is a guy who seemed to think protections against lightning was somehow a protection against EMP. I'm not at all convinced he even understands what EMP actually is. Until he convinces me he understands the nature of HEMP, (and talking about Occupy doesn't tend to make me think he does) I'll continue to give his opinions the weight I think they deserve.

These guys keep talking about circuit breakers and off-line as if any of that protects against EMP. We'll get some warning on a Carrington Event, but I'd be surprised if they shut down the national grid in advance. And even if they did, yes, Mr. B., there would still be massive damage to the transformer net:

Bill, if you have a transformer off-line or the circuit breaker has been properly tripped (fast enough) then a transformer simply won't work, as the circuit isn't complete. IF you have a circuit breaker with a fast enough clamping speed, you MIGHT have a transformer survive, this also assume the circuit breaker is faster than the induced eddy currents. The really big caveat is the the sheer cost of a circuit breaker with a fast enough clamping speed, they are possible, but the necessary alloys are expensive as heck. And they are almost an art-form to make.

The key is that induced currents, inside the transformers, still take a finite amount of time to build up. (It's very, very important at this point, of wether the EMP is acting as a particle or a wave)

Lots of even congresscritters, are fully cognizant of the need of such units, but lots more just flat out don't want pay for such units, just on the chance they might needed.

That's why the necessary warning from NOAA is as critical as the willingness to do the right thing, to act properly, on such warning. Our Western Technic Civilization has the material technology, to give us a really good chance at surviving even a Major CME/Carrington Event, intact, but this assumes our fearless leaders pay for the technology to be in place, or set up the right response to such an event, and thus far things really aren't looking that good. With an EMP bomb, you just flat out not have the time to have the grid prepared properly, but due to massive nature of a CME, you COULD set up the proper response ahead of time. (But then you would have to pay the political cost, if it wasn't needed)

I'm afraid non-nuclear EMP bombs have been around, since the 1950's. And microwave based EMP beam weapons have around nearly as long. What the recent developments are referring to, are much more portable versions and drone mountable versions, and not necessarily using explosives.

Just a side note, you can use a laser beam as a conductive medium to focus either a EMP or a static charge......real nasty on electronics, in either case. But they weren't very portable, or very rugged.

What the recent developments are referring to, are much more portable versions and drone mountable versions, and not necessarily using explosives.

Ah...so the weapon has been 'weaponized'. When can I have a pocket EMP to fry the rude and ubiquitous cells and 'pods that so many are compelled to carry?

[OT aside]Seriously, the laser focusing is interesting. Could one modulate a low-power laser pointer with a frequency that would interrupt a cell-phone connection at 50 yards? My neighbor sits on her porch for hours loudly jabbering nonsense. I've looked at cellphone jammers, but they're more or less omnidirectional and not powerful enough to do the job. Of course, this is just hypothetical as interrupting cellphone transmissions is against the law. [/OT]

That's why the necessary warning from NOAA is as critical as the willingness to do the right thing, to act properly, on such warning. Our Western Technic Civilization has the material technology, to give us a really good chance at surviving even a Major CME/Carrington Event, intact, but this assumes our fearless leaders pay for the technology to be in place, or set up the right response to such an event, and thus far things really aren't looking that good. With an EMP bomb, you just flat out not have the time to have the grid prepared properly, but due to massive nature of a CME, you COULD set up the proper response ahead of time. (But then you would have to pay the political cost, if it wasn't needed)

Ken, nobody, least of all me, is arguing that there are not many things we could do to protect ourselves against HEMP, CME, Carrington Events, and other EM phenomena. The problem is, we aren't doing those things! And one of the reasons we aren't is that too many folks like Psi just don't seem to understand the nature of the threat - why prepare for something that is harmless or impossible? If EMP isn't a threat, why do anything about it at all?

That's why I push back against the misinformation peddled by these folks, and why I'm writing a major two-book novel in order to raise awareness of the scope of the threat.

BTW, I haven't seen anything posted here from any of you that I wasn't already aware of, including all the portable non-nuke systems. And you do know that such weapons were admittedly (by Don Rumsfeld) used against Saddam Hussein in 2003?

Pardon my cynicism, Bill, but the most likely reason there is no state-funded prep for EMP disaster is that there's little profit in it for them. They'd rather push the phoney AGW/carbon-as-pollutant agenda where they can create regulation/taxation to further their control of business and the population.

WASHINGTON – The congressman who first brought the potentially catastrophic effects of an electromagnetic pulse event to the nation’s attention is now under fire from the electric power industry that has fought voluntary efforts to protect the national grid with hardened transformers.

Bartlett recently won an initial victory with the U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, or FERC, which agreed with him on Oct. 18 that the electric power industry must be required to submit a plan to protect the national power grid from a catastrophic blackout that could be inflicted by a solar super storm.

The victory also comes at a time when the U.S. East coast is experiencing a “perfect storm”– this time on land – that could affect the lives of 60 million people in terms of electrical outages, floods and the massive destruction of property.

The FERC order now is subject to a comment period which will take debate over the order well into next year, when both the National Aeronautic and Space Administration and the National Academy of Sciences say solar storms that have been bombarding Earth will reach their highest intensity.

Bartlett is up against the North American Electric Reliability Corporation, or NERC, which is supposed to be responsible for protecting the electric power grid but has mounted a well-funded lobby to oppose any new government regulation of the electric power industry.

Earlier this year, the NERC published a controversial report denying the threat from a solar super storm, claiming that even the most powerful such storm – similar to the 1859 Carrington Event – could cause a blackout lasting only hours or days, not months or years.

NERC further asserted that if another Carrington Event happened today, it would not be a national catastrophe – only an inconvenience.

However, the NERC is alone in such a judgment that a solar super storm would not be a potentially catastrophic event.

You're right, it's money again, but NERC is peddling the same kind of ignorant (and in their case, self-serving) BS that many others are pushing, solely to avoid having to upgrade their preparations against the well-documented possibility of such events.

I s'pose that what we need is a close call...just enough of a solar event to knock out a few satellites and fry some transformers, but not so big that it throws us back a century. Just as Sandy was a kind of wakeup for folks 'round here to the need for preps, a good EMP scare would create demand that might be loud enough to be heard.

As for the utility companies, one of these daze the hacktivists will target 'em and zero the smart meters.